Why Intuition Belongs in Your Business Strategy.

Market research, KPIs, strategic frameworks. These are all important building blocks of a solid business strategy. But before we did into these, there is one more ingredient worth weaving in: your intuition. 

When I work with women entrepreneurs, I don't decide what is best for their business in a vacuum. Instead, I'm listening for their intuition on where the business needs to go. Cues like areas they bring up time and time again, where their energy lies, key data points or facts that they speak passionately to.

I've seen what happens when you build a strategy around that intuition. At my last organization, I listened closely to our founder and how she spoke about our programs. Subtleties in how she described each program, words that suggested where she innately saw value, topics that visibly energized her or deflated her energy. Instead of fighting this, we leaned in, and the results were HUGE.

When we built a strategic plan that doubled down on the areas she was excited about, where she really saw value in the organization, we grew and we grew big. We tripled the organization and 10x'd our output. There was a visible shift in how she was able to share out our goals and initiatives. She was able to throw her passion behind our big goals and we could pitch with authenticity and excitement.

But as a leader or solopreneur, your intuition can easily get buried in day-to-day tasks, frustrations with difficult clients or lagging sales, and it can make you start to scramble. I know, because I've been there. In starting up the Venture Together Collective, I had a very clear vision of what I wanted to achieve. And then the scope creep, the desire to build more in all directions, the mental chaos started to take over. So I leaned into what I know is critical. Building a business strategy that gives you a dynamic roadmap on how to move forward. Step one, deep listening.

Here are the two practices I use to access my intuition so it can actually inform my strategy: journaling and conversation with others.

Journaling is the tool that helped me start this business. I've written about it before. To spark creativity and to create an environment to help me daydream about my future, I started the book The Artist's Way. While I didn't get far into the workbook, I committed to doing a month of "morning pages" and it was so refreshing and calming to hear my thoughts come out so clearly without all the noise and distractions. The beauty for me of morning pages is that it is stream-of-consciousness journaling, so I didn't get stuck the way I do with journal prompts or feel the need to be poetic or insightful. I hate writing, actually, so this was a perfect approach for me. I just wrote down 3 pages of whatever came to my mind and by the 3rd page, my intuition often (but not always) showed up. And things like what I wanted to spend my time doing really came through clearly.

After just one week back, it started working. I started the month feeling behind, overwhelmed, and frustrated that the great start of the new year felt more like a restart of my business.

Journaling gave me a place to process these feelings and disregard some of the unproductive ones. And it's given me focus on where I need to be spending my time to have the 2026 I envision. Now the "restart" frustration is starting to transform into the fresh-start excitement around the community we are building here at Venture Together and what we can offer fellow women entrepreneurs.

But not only have I been reflecting internally, I’m listening to the conversations I’m having with others. Listening for cues in where I'm excited and where I hear dread in my voice. I listen to what others reflect back to me in the recommendations and comments they make.

This is the power of surrounding ourselves with others, especially those in a similar spot. Not only can they relate to how we are feeling, which helps us feel validated and seen, but they often know how to listen to intuition and they are listening for yours. I've watched this happen when we sit around the table and one business leader responds to another with "you really seem energized about that idea. What if you focus your attention on that first? Maybe that will be an easier lift and it aligns with your strategy."

And even when others are just listening, we get to hear ourselves in a new way. When you say something out loud, you feel it differently. You notice where your energy goes, what lights you up, what falls flat. That is your intuition talking, and it is one of the most underutilized inputs in your business strategy. We can (and should) go to the classes and workshops and read the books, but your intuition is the asset no course can give you. You started this company for a reason and no one knows it better than you.

So if you are feeling like your day-to-day is muddying your clarity, join me in this journaling challenge. Even if you don't get to it every day, it will give you a space to look inside and listen. And then come join us at Venture Together, online or around the table, and hear what you are sharing with the rest of us. We'll be listening for your intuition too.